Iran Focus: Vienna, June 15 A briefing by the United Nations nuclear watchdog on the progress of its work in Iran lent credence to revelations by an Iranian opposition group back in November that Iran continues to hide critical information on its controversial nuclear program. Officials at the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency have informed diplomats that Iran had not given access requested by the IAEA to the Lavizan and Parchin military sites, where weaponization work is suspected.
Front-Page Magazine: Amid intense calls by Irans democratic opposition for the boycott of the upcoming June 17 presidential elections and Tehrans worried rush to showcase the sham as a sign of its popular legitimacy, Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani is reported to be the front-runner. 
AFP: Hundreds of Iranian Kurds have clashed violently with police in the northwestern Iranian town of Mahabad, an historical centre of Kurdish nationalism, the official news agency IRNA said Wednesday. The rioting, which came just days before Iran is due to elect a new president, was sparked by news from across the border in Iraq that former rebel leader Massoud Barzani was sworn in as the first president of Iraqi Kurdistan. 
Daily Telegraph: This week’s Iranian presidential election might have new features such as internet campaigning and focus groups, but there is little new about the most likely winner, Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani. In an eight-strong field that includes hard-liners and reformers, civilians and former officers, Mr Rafsanjani, a two-term president whose career stretches back three decades, is expected to prevail. 
AFP: One of Iran’s struggling presidential candidates has come up with a novel way to get votes: buy them — openly. Mehdi Karoubi, a mid-ranking cleric and political moderate, has promised that if elected he will start paying everyone over the age of 18 the sum of 500,000 rials (55 dollars) every month — no questions asked. 
The Times: A machiavellian figure with little concept of human rights, civil liberties or demo-cracy is the default darling among Western diplomats to win the Iranian presidential election on Friday. They see Hojatoleslam Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, 70, a former President and the front-runner this time, as the only chance to halt Irans nuclear programme. 
Reuters: The head of the U.N. nuclear watchdog urged Iran on Tuesday to allow a team of experts to return to a military site called Parchin, which they inspected once but have since been barred from visiting. “I would … ask Iran to support the agency’s efforts to pursue further its investigation of the Lavizan-Shian and Parchin sites,” Mohamed ElBaradei said, adding that his inspectors wanted to visit “areas of interest” at Parchin. 
AP: To understand the true significance of Iran’s presidential elections look no further than a collection of modest brick buildings decorated with slogans from the Islamic Revolution. Here sits the country’s real power a power that will ride out any outcome Friday: the clerical regime that considers itself answerable only to God. 
AFP: Fear, pollution and poverty stalk the Iranian industrial city of Pakdasht where the inhabitants have lost faith in successive governments and feel trapped in a hand-to-mouth existence. Just 50 kilometres (30 miles) outside the capital on the desert highway to Afghanistan, Pakdasht is choked with pollution from industrial plants and notorious as the site of some of the worst serial killings in Iran’s modern history. 